Dark Witch
by Montanasky4
Summary: Damian Von Shrieder has been hunting vampires for the better part of a thousand years. He has yet to find his lifemate. Selene Dauphin is a witch. Together they will uncover truths and how they play into both of their past, present and future.
1. Chapter 1

The moon has shown her face in near full glory. Damian Von Shrieder has not been so close to home in nearly a thousand years. However, it is not a social visit that brings him to the Carpathian Mountains. Duty has brought him here. Duty and a vow. He is a warrior, a hunter, like the other men in his family. Even now, he can sense his cousins, Vikirnoff and Nicolae, are not too far away. He was but a fledgling when the two brothers left to hunt vampires. He would like to see them again—to see them happy and with their lifemates but his vow keeps him from crossing deeper into the mountains. This vow—the plea of his long time friend and comrade in arms—to kill him if he became vampire. And he is close to fulfilling his vow, so close he can smell it.

It has taken him long enough, he recalls as he crouches low and fists the soft earth. Long enough to return and longer than it should to fulfill his vow. Over nine hundred years ago he was sent on a crusade to kill the vermin of their kind along with his boyhood friend, Sebastian. They traveled across Europe and so far as the United States of America to carry out their duty. It's been a little more than twelve years since Sebastian drank a man dry, forfeiting his soul and becoming a vampire. And Damian has been hunting his friend ever since.

He lets the soil fall from his hand and stands, eyeing the bait for his trap—the human man he has strung up to a tree. If he has learned anything about his prey's habits, it is that a vampire can never pass up a meal. Damian doesn't care if the man lives or dies, as long as tonight _is_ the night. If he managed to kill Sebastian before, he would end the man himself. He steps over to his bait, unconscious and unaware of his current predicament. This will not do. Damian chose this man specifically. Like his usual prey, the vampire, he studied the man who would be his bait. The man before him was recently released from a correctional facility after serving a sentence for child pornography and raping an underage boy. Such vermin are just as bad as vampires. This man does not deserve to reenter society. And he does not deserve to go out easy.

Damian extends a finger and promptly jabs the man in the gut. It does just as he intended when his bait breathes a whoosh of air and his beady eyes pop open. Damian had sought to the man's mouth before strapping him to the tree, gagging him to prevent him from talking. When the man's eyes settle on Damian they threaten to bulge from his head. In a few moments he is coated in a sheen of sweat and his struggling only makes his confinement more uncomfortable.

"Struggle or don't struggle. It will be over soon enough."

The man's heart rate increases as his fear escalates and Damian can't help admiring how both carotid arteries repetitively jump in his neck. He is caught in the trance of it, the sweet music of the man's life blood thrumming through his body. Sure he could take a pint or two for himself. But this man is not his to feed on. This man serves a purpose—bait. And bait he will be.

With the same finger Damian had used to poke the man to consciousness, Damian brings his lengthening nail to his bait's neck. He makes a point to avoid both arteries, as to not bleed the man out too quickly, and swipes his nail along the soft flesh of the bait's neck, effectively slicing skin and drawing blood.

Damian stands back to admire his handiwork and to remind him to exercise his own willpower. A breeze rolls down the mountains. _Good. That will carry the blood to him._

He crouches low to the earth again, cupping the soil in his hands. I _t has to be tonight_. He releases the soil for the last time before he melts into the cluster of trees around him.

It shouldn't take long. He knows he must be ready for when the time comes.

Minutes go by. Possibly the longest minutes in his thousand plus years of life. Just when Damian wonders how much longer he'll have to wait, he senses Sebastian close and moving fast.

In an instant Sebastian whorls past him and Damian moves from the tree cover to see Sebastian latched to the bait's neck. The sounds of his friend slurping the blood from the pedophile's neck echos through the night. Sebastian keeps sucking and biting until he's nearly severed the man's head from his body.

Damian uses that moment to strike. Pining Sebastian to his victim and the tree, Damian punches his fist through the back of his prey, his fist opening only to wrap his fingers around Sebastian's heart. When his grip is secure, he wrenches back his arm, pulling free Sebastian's heart. The tearing of his aorta and vena cavas make a popping sound, the likes of which Damian will never forget. The sound will ring in his ears for the rest of his life. And if it all goes to plan, it won't be much longer.

He calls upon lightning from the sky as the Carpathian people do, effectively setting Sebastian's heart on fire.

"Finally," Sebastian utters just before his heart turns to ash in Damian's hand.

He lets the lightning clean his hand of Sebastian's blood but when it's gone he swears he can still feel the warm liquid and the pumping of his friend's heart.

Next, he releases the human body from the tree, the bloody mess it is, and destroys it; any and all evidence of what occurred here this night.

When the adrenaline leaves his body he is left feeling utterly empty. Empty of emotion other than that he gets during a hunt. Empty of color in his vision even during the last sights he will ever have of his homeland. Empty of his only true companion for the last thousand years. Empty of a lifemate that he will never know.

There is nothing left for him to do but to meet the dawn. _It's better to end it now then to become a vampire, with no one to vow to destroy me_.

He walks his way up the nearest mountain, not wanting to exert any more energy. He has not fed this night and his hunger will not be abated for much longer. The sun will rise in a few hours and he needs to be at the top of the mountain when it does. The less time he has up there to change his mind, the better.

It doesn't take him long, having easily navigated the mountain's smooth terrain. It is evermore quiet when he reaches the top. Nothing but the moon and the stars above him. He turns to face the direction the sun will rise, wanting to greet the sun head on like a Carpathian should before it's too late.

Movement catches his eye and he focuses to see a figure no more than fifty feet from him. It's a woman, no doubt by her hourglass figure. Though all he can see is her silhouette, he can tell her back is to him. His hunger gnawing at him and his blood surges through his body with renewed effort. She is a feast just for him, here when he needed it most. He lunges without meaning to and in a heartbeat he is behind her. She senses him then and turns in shock, her brown eyes wide. And then she disappears and Damian's arms wrap around empty air.

His knees sink to the ground. In his last moments he is driven by delusions. Delusions of a brown-eyed woman—

Brown. Eyes. Color.

At this time his imagination regained the ability to recall color—an ability that was lost to him for centuries. It is impossible. So impossible in fact that the only explanation for him seeing color was that he had come into contact with his lifemate.

That woman. Could she be? How had she disappeared?

Damian suddenly feels the pull to go to ground, his instincts telling him the sun will rise soon. He can't very well be on this mountain when it does, not when the possibility of finding his lifemate seems so close at hand. Pushing off the ground he resolves to go to ground if only to find this brown-eyed woman.


	2. Chapter 2

Snapping back into her corporeal body immediately gives Selene Dauphin a feeling of whiplash. Moments before she was standing atop one of the lesser Carpathian mountains, with a spectacular view of the night sky and now she finds herself exactly where she expected to be. She sighs with relief. Astral projection is a tricky thing. There is always the chance of the spirit not making it back to its body. And it _had_ been touch and go for a moment when she got that ominous feeling and turned to see a beast charging at her from the darkness. Although whatever it was couldn't hurt her physically in her corporeal state, it had be enough to startle her and she tugged on the magical thread that connected her to her body.

"Well, how was it?"

Selene looked up to see her friend, Victoria Proveaux, who sat directly across from her, staring at her expectantly.

"I don't think it's a good idea," she replies while blowing out the candles encircling her.

"What do you mean? We chose that location specifically. The full moon is tomorrow night. We don't have enough time to locate and prep another spot."

She pushes a hand through her hair only to realize it was shaking, glad the room is now encased in darkness.

"Vicky, there was something else on that mountain. Something other than me."

"Maybe it was a mountain lion or a wolf."

"It looked like a man to me."

"A local then."

Selene grumbles. "You're not listening to me."

"You're right, I'm not. You get all weird after you astral project."

Her friend stands and moves through the room to flick on the light switch. Selene is momentarily blinded. Blinking helps to readjust her vision to the newly lit room at the inn they are staying in. Her gaze lands on her mocha colored friend who is still standing next to the light switch; her hair a gorgeous mess of tightly-ringed curls. The two women are strongly contrasted. Where Selene has fair skin framed by dark brown hair with brown eyes, Vicky is the totally opposite, favoring her mother apart from her blue-grey eyes that she inherited from her father.

"What are you staring at?" asks Vicky with her hands on her hips.

"I was just reminded of your mother and how much you look like her just now."

Vicky holds one hand out in front of her, palm facing towards her friend. "Don't go there. I know you're not trying to make this about our mothers. For all we know you were imagining what you saw. I did not beg my father to send me abroad in Europe to study witchcraft under your aunt just for you to get all weird on me and back out the night before we attempt a massive spell."

"Vicky, our mothers' coven were—"

"No! I don't want to hear it." She moves from the wall to collect the candles surrounding Selene and place them in a burgundy velvet sack. "Tomorrow we are going to take everything we need up to that mountain and then when the full moon rises we will cast that damned spell."

Selene resolves to helping her friend clean up. "I hate it when you get all demandy on me."

"Demandy, really?," Vicky responds with a scoff. "You're next in line to become High Priestess. Someone needs to keep you in line and you don't have many friends in our coven so that duty has fallen on me."

"And it's part of the reason I love you so much."

Vicky rolls her eyes at her silly friend.

Selene knows that Vicky needs her to cast that spell, she is after all, the stronger of the two. If they miss tomorrow's full moon, Vicky would have to wait another month for Selene to help her increase her power and she was already falling behind in the coven. Despite Selene's own fears, she is determined to help her friend. But that doesn't mean she is going to be sloppy about it. Tomorrow night Selene will be on high alert, wary of any suspicious activity while they are on that mountain.


	3. Chapter 3

Selene parks her Jeep just off the side of the dirt road. Vicky slides out of the passenger seat with the burgundy velvet bag full of their supplies, giving the pack a thorough check. They will have to hike the rest of the way, hence why Selene chose to astral project to the mountain the night before. However, they will need to be in their corporeal forms to perform this particular spell.

Selene pulls her phone from her pocket, using the compass and GPS apps to help navigate.

"It should take us at least an hour," she tells Vicky.

"I'm all set here."

"Good."

Selene looks up to the sky, what little she can see through the canopy of trees. The sun had set two hours ago. They should have more than enough time to make it up the mountain and set up before the moon reaches its high point in the sky.

Although she's glad that she listened to Vicky and decided not to look for another location, she remains wary of any signs of danger and wear a talisman of alder wood around her neck.

Damian wakes from his rejuvenating sleep; the soil of his homeland sticking to his naked body. With only a thought, the remainder disappears from his skin and clothing appears in its stead. The weather is somewhat crisp this night but it doesn't bother him. Still he dons a pair of dark blue jeans, boots, a t-shirt, and a sweater.

His goal is clear tonight. He will find the woman who disappeared from the top of the mountain. He will find his lifemate.

Hunger bats at him but he pushes the thought away. His only remaining will is to find her and claim her so that he may once again have control over himself. To feed now, without being anchored to his lifemate's soul is a spell for disaster. With that, he flees the cave that protected him during his rest.

In no time at all he catches the scent of a human wandering the trails along the Carpathian Mountains. Turning into mist, he sneaks up behind his prey only to discover a human man. Hunger gnaws at him. With a quick command he sends the man far from the mountain.

It is then that he catches a different scent. Human but not human. Female. And there are two of them.

A smile spreads across his face, for the first time in centuries. Taking the form of a hawk, Damian follows their scents which lead him to fly up to the top of a mountain, the same mountain he spotted his brown-eyed lifemate.

He's there in minutes. His tracking skills have led him to a clearing with little tree cover. Still in the form of a hawk, he lands on a tree branch with a perfect view of the clearing atop the mountain. Damian spots them then, the two women. He watches them, observes them as the fair-skinned one carves a pentacle into the dirt with a stick. The darker-skinned one retrieves candles from a burgundy sack. Burgundy! He was right after all. One of these women is his lifemate. he wants to move closer, to see which of these women have brown colored eyes, but he refrains.

The fair-skinned one—she looks to be in her early twenties, but it is so hard to tell with human women these days—takes two candles from her companion and they both place a candle at each point of the pentacle. With a flick of the fair one's wrist, the candles are lit with flame.

Sorcery is Damian's first thought. He hasn't heard of the likes since Rhiannon Dragonseeker was stolen away by a mage. It's been a long time since he's seen it first hand, although he cousin, Vikirnoff, is a lifemate to one of Rhiannon's descendants and has retained some of the mage's abilities. He stows that knowledge away for now.

The two women proceed to undress. The hawk's eyes widen as he befalls the sight in front of him. It is almost enough to send him from the tree and to the ground where the women stand naked before the moonlight.

The fair-skinned woman scans their surroundings, turning in Damian's direction as she does so, the moon to her back. He is still too far away to get a good look at her eye color. She seems to find nothing alarming and her posture relaxes. As she turns away again, he notices her pulling a necklace over her head and add it the the pile of clothing.

Neither women seem to notice the chill in the air.

"Just a few minutes, now," the fair-skinned one says to her companion.

"Do you want your robe?" her dark-skinned companion asks.

"You can toss it to me."

Her companion does as requested, retrieving two black lace robes from the burgundy sack, tossing one to her friend and keeping the other for herself. However, they do not don the robes. Instead both women leave them outside the circle of the pentacle.

The moon reaches its high point in the sky, and Damian watches silently, perched in a tree branch, as the women step into the pentacle, take hands and begin chanting. If it wasn't obvious before, it certainly is now. These women are casting a spell.


	4. Chapter 4

They reach for each other's hands.

"Mother Goddess, hear us," says Selene.

She nods to Vicky who begins chanting in time with Selene.

Eyes closed now, Selene grounds herself, letting the elements of the earth surround her. The soil is soft beneath her toes. She can feel the tickle of the air around them. The heat emitting off the lit candles warm her skyclad body. There is little moisture in the air but her body is mostly of water. She lets everything else fall away; anything that would cause a distraction; opening her spirit so that she might aid Vicky tonight with this spell.

The mountain air has gone chill. A strong gust of wind blows out the candles.

That's when she hears Vicky's shrieking scream.

Selene's eyes pop open to see Vicky in the grasp of a man with his teeth sinking into her friend's neck.

Momentarily frozen in place, her mind goes blank. She does nothing as blood persists to ooze from Vicky's neck as her attacking continues to tear at her flesh with his lengthened incisors.

The gruesome scene before her bring terrible memories from her past to the forefront of her mind, seizing her from taking action in the present. She wills those debilitating and horrific memories away. When Selene finally snaps back to reality she is about to cast a spell when she catches sight of a hawk in the corner of her eye as it swoops towards her friend. She is stunned further when the hawk transforms into a man right before her eyes.

The newcomer wrenches Vicky's attacker off of her, tossing him several feet away and Vicky collapses to the ground in a bloody mess, reaching for her neck to stop the blood flow from her torn carotid artery.

Selene can now see Vicky's attacker in perfect clarity as Vicky's rescuer attempts to subdue him. Vicky's attacker is dressed like a hobo, his clothes unkempt. There is a terrible stench coming off him that smells unpure. She gets a good look at his face; a decaying mess of flesh. The skin on his face seems too tight for his skull and his hair is thinning. The only comparison Selene can make to Vicky's attacker is to a zombie from a television program. Never in her wildest imagination did she think that zombies could exist. But then again zombies are not so different from ghouls.

Just then, the zombie-like figure springs to attack Vicky's rescuer. It seems for the moment that his attentions are off of Vicky. That seems to snap Selene out of it and she goes to Vicky, reaching for the nearest piece of clothing, Vicky's shirt, and holding it to her friend's neck. She looks pale. Whatever her attacker did, he took a lot of blood from her and more continues to pour out from her.

Looking around for anything else that can help stop the flow of blood, Selene catches a glance at the two men, one decaying and the other a glorious hero, all muscles and speed. Although from the looks of it, Vicky's rescuer seems to be having trouble subduing the other who has now developed nasty looking claws and razor sharp teeth.

"Vic, can you hold it there?"

Vicky blinks and Selene takes that as a yes.

Hands covered in her friend's blood, Selene stands, resigned to cast a spell to aid Vicky's rescuer. The words she utters are barely audible but they are enough. The decaying man freezes in place. The other man looks over his shoulder at her and nods. He has a predatory look on his face just before he turns back to the decaying man, his prey.

"You should go. Take your friend and go." The man says without turning back to her. She watches from behind as his hand balls into a fist.

But she doesn't move. Not frozen in place as before. This time her stillness is voluntary.

Time seems to slow as the man punches through the decaying man's chest. He wrenches his arm back, only now he has something in his grasp. With horror, Selene realizes that it is the decaying man's still beating heart.

From the clear night sky suddenly appears a bolt of lightening that strikes the heart in the man's hand, incinerating it. Though the man seems unscathed. The decaying man erupts into flames before her eyes. Only then does time seem to return to normal speed.

Her knees go weak and she can feel herself falling. Strong hands catch her shoulder and set her upright.

"Are you alright?" says the man before her.

His question doesn't fully register. She's too preoccupied with his face; sharp planes and strong jaw. His eyes are green and when she looks at them she can almost see into his soul. Her attention draws to his mouth. His mouth is positively the most sensual thing she's ever seen; as if it's daring to kiss her and daring her to kiss him in return. But this is no time for kissing. She reads his lips as he asks her her question for the second time.

"I—I. Vicky! She's—"

He let's go of her shoulders then and turns his attention on Vicky. Her eyelids are droopy. She's fading fast.

Crouching down to Vicky's level, he inspects her. "Your friend has lost a lot of blood." He states matter-of-factly.

This night has been a whirlwind for Selene. She spent years putting the tragedies that occurred in her past behind her. She doesn't trust what she's seen tonight. But this is not about her now. Vicky is in mortal danger. Selene resigns to put her fear on the mental back-burner. It's the least she can do for Vicky. "We have to get her to the hospital. My car is at least an hour hike down the mountain."

"There's no time."

He brings his forearm to his mouth and sinks his teeth into his flesh.

"What are you doing?" With horror she wonders if she just helped one bad guy get rid of another and that this one will finish them both off. But then again, why did he care if she was alright?

With his wrist torn and bloody, he brings it to Vicky's mouth. "Drink." She does so without argument and she doesn't appear to dislike the taste either—instead her reaction seems to be just the opposite as her tongue laps any stray droplets of blood.

"My blood will heal her."

"What?"

"I'm answering your question."

Selene's eyebrows knit together at his smart remark. Before she can come up with a remark of her own she realizes she's still skyclad, naked to the moon.

He realizes it too, his gaze lingering appreciatively. She never looks away though. Nudity has never been an issue for her and she refuses to let this man intimidate her. When it appears he's finished appreciating her, he tears his gaze away to tell Vicky that she has taken enough. Selene watches as he licks the wound on his forearm and that it comes away without any evidence that it was just torn open and bleeding.

Looking over him she sees the color in Vicky's pallor seems to have returned. Selene reaches for her black lace robe, dons it and then retrieves Vicky's. Moving between them to afford Vicky some modesty she directs her attention to the man still crouching before her. "Are you a familiar?"

He regards her as if she has ten heads.

"I saw you in the form of a hawk."

"I can take the form of many things."

"What are you? What was that thing that attacked her?"

He stands. "Why don't I escort you both home?"

Selene tilts her head back to look up at him. "Why don't you answer my questions?"

"Although I've given her my blood, your friend is still very weak. She may not need medical attention but she will need rest. If it will satisfy you, I will answer your questions then."

Every fiber in Selene's being is telling her to fight him on this but the rational part of her brain reminds her that Vicky remains in a terrible state. Without another word to the man, she turns to her friend. Vicky is now covered in her own robe but her legs are still too weak to stand on. Selene offers to help her up. She's barely gotten her hands on her when the man appears on the other side of Vicky, lifting her into his arms. Selene's chest tightens at the sight in an unpleasant way that she decides to let go for the moment.

The man holds Vicky in his arms as he would a child. "You said you had a car down the mountain."

"I did," says Selene, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I'll retrieve it for you later. It's in your best interest to get you two home."

"I'm not leaving my car in the Carpathian Mountains."

"Better the car than you. Now, climb onto my back."

"I'll do no such thing!"

He sighs. Still Selene doesn't feel as though she's won.

"No, you haven't."

Selene's eyes widen. "Did you just read my mind?"

By way of response, she hears the hum of his male humor in her head. _It is going to be a long night if you fight me on this. We have much to discuss. Climb onto my back so that I may take you home and give you the answers you so crave._

"I live a good days drive from the Carpathian Mountains. We've been staying at a local inn."

"Then I shall take you to the inn."

"I don't even know your name. Nor have I told you mine."

His gaze skims up and down the length of her. She doesn't know how he is able to read her mind but she in that moment she wishes she did so that she might read his to know what he's thinking when he looks at her. His expression gives nothing away. And then there's that male humor echoing in her head. "Stop that!" she snaps.

He does his best attempt at a smile that does not make him look predatory. "My name is Damian Von Shreider."

She doesn't offer her own name. Instead she takes a deep breath. Selene knows that she must stay strong for Vicky, at least until they're both safe. "Well, Damian, if you follow through with answering all my questions, I may just tell you mine in return."

Silence stretches between them.

Selene eyes him warily. "Don't forget that I helped you destroy whatever that thing was that attacked Vicky. I can stop you if I need to."

He met her gaze straight on. "I have no doubt you can."

"You're not going to turn back into a hawk are you?"

Damian shakes his head. "But I am still going to fly."

Against her better judgment she climbs onto his back, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his shoulders. She can feel the heat radiating off of him.

She can tell that this night is far from over.


	5. Chapter 5

Damian gains the location of the inn from her mind. After they have had their discussion he will tell her that she should better guard her mind. He's too distracted now to do anything other than fly.

From the moment she climbed onto his back he was all too well aware of her naked front pressed to his back. And it doesn't help that she has her legs around his waist. He feels the warmth radiating from between her legs to the middle of his back. It is a battle of control. If he didn't have her friend in his arms he would turn around and claim her in the air. Just that thought alone has every muscle in his body at attention and his blood pooling low in the center of his body.

In further attempt to distract himself, he regards the woman in his arms. Vicky, as the fair-skinned one had referred to her. Her eyes are closed, but she is not asleep. She hasn't said a word since she was attacked by the vampire and she remains quiet even in his arms, undoubtedly in shock.

Just then he feels warm lips at his ear, warm breath causing his cock to twitch in his jeans.

"I haven't thanked you for helping us."

"Are you thanking me now?" He looks over his shoulder, seeing the fair-skinned woman in the corner of his eye.

"I haven't decided yet. That depends on you."

He catches the sly smile forming in the corner of her mouth. "You're welcome."

Any further conversation comes to a halt when the inn is in sight. She directs him to Vicky's room by way of the balcony. Damian touches down on the wood softly. He feels the cold air on his back instantly as she peels herself from him.

"Don't go inside yet. We warded our rooms."

He turns to regard her but she is already moving in front of him, drawing her robe closed. Her head is tilted down so that her brown hair forms a curtain around her face, preventing him from seeing her expression. She has taken better care of her mind too, but he is still able to gather her slight embarrassment from having her naked self pressed against a stranger. He won't be a stranger for long, he assures himself. And once he's claimed her, she won't ever shy her body away from him again.

Damian watches wordlessly as she utters a few phrases and then tries one of the double doors leading into the room. It opens without contest. She steps inside and gestures him in by the tilt of her head. His is careful of Vicky in his arms.

"You can put her on the bed."

He does so without complaint while she rummages through the drawers across the room. When he places Vicky down, the darker-skinned woman curls up into the fetal position. The shock will wear off soon, no doubt, and then the terror will sweep in. He backs away from the bed just as her friend comes between them with a set of pajamas.

"Turn around while I dress her, please."

He nods, affording the women some privacy.

"Easy does it, Vic. One arm and then the other. Now your legs."

He turns back before she gives him the okay but Vicky is already dressed and her friend is helping her under the covers. The fair-skinned one is still clad in her black lace robe. He can still see the shape of her, the moonlight shinning in the room, illuminating her pale skin underneath.

"It's safe now. Rest."

Damian watches as she stokes her friend's forehead as she would a child before turning away from the bed and walking towards him. She goes to grab his arm, her fingers unable to wrap around the width of him, in a move to usher him out. He can't help but picture her fingers wrapping around another part of his body. Shaking his head, he lets her lead him from the room and into the hallway.

"I can suppress the memory for her, if you'd like."

"That's up to Victoria," she hisses. "And we have spells for that."

She leads him to the door of the adjacent room, pausing a moment to undo the wards. With a flick of the wrist, the door opens and she sashays inside.

He follows her inside, closing the door behind him. As a precaution, he sets up wards of his own on both of the rooms in case any vampire has somehow got onto the trail he took pains to cloaking.

"I'm just going to change and then you better start squawking." He scoffs at her choice of phrase as she disappears into the bathroom.

The room is lit by several candles scattered around on the floor, dresser drawers, and vanity. There is a faded pentacle chalked on the wood flooring.

"Are you a sorceress?" he asks, curiosity getting the better of him.

"A witch, actually," she replies, causing his eyebrow to draw up.

All in all, he supposes, if Carpathians exist, there's no reason witches couldn't, although he never really thought about it before.

"I've never encountered a witch," he admits.

She emerges from the bathroom in a tank top and draw-string pajama pants. It's enough to make him clear his mind or risk the beast in him rising. He did not fed much this rising and giving Vicky blood has him running low. He needs sustenance and seeing his the barely clothed witch who is somehow his lifemate has ever nerve at attention.

"Which brings us to what you are. You said you would answer my questions. You've told me your name. Damian, right?" he nods. "Well, Damian, you're not human and you're not a familiar, then what are you?"

He likes the way she said his name. And he noticed how she still neglected to offer her own. "I'm a Carpathian, a very old and powerful people. My ancestors come from the Carpathian Mountains and it is where I was born and raised. Though local legend would suggest that we are immortal, it is simply longevity on our side. Carpathians can live for thousands of years. In fact, we are considered fledglings until we reach the two hundred year mark. We have the ability to turn into any animal and can control the natural elements around us to an extent in addition to some magical ones. We are a nocturnal race, walking the earth at night and sleeping the healing sleep in the earth by day. Blood is our sustenance—"

"Blood. You mean that you drink blood in order to live?"

"Yes."

"Like a vampire?"

"I am not Vampire." His voice sounding harsher than he means it to.

She takes a step back from him. "And that thing that attacked Vicky?"

"That _thing_ that attacked your friend was Vampire, yes."

Her hand instinctively goes to her throat. "You can't be serious. Vampires actually exist?"

He nods.

"Yet you also drink blood."

"Carpathians and Vampires are not the same. Vampires are the result of a Carpathian draining a life. They essentially lose their souls and become undead."

She shakes her head in disbelief. "But you're not a Vampire?"

"I am not. Although the danger is still there."

"What do you mean?"

"The males of my people live for centuries, as I've said. During that time they begin to lose their emotions, their ability to feel things like happiness and love. They know only duty. They also lose all color from their vision, living in a world of grey. The only feeling males get at that point is the adrenaline rush from a kill. In that time, the darkness in our souls draws us into taking the plunge, draining a human of their lifeblood and condemning our souls to that darkness. In essence, becoming Vampire."

"And you are in danger of becoming Vampire? That's what you're telling me. Just how old are you?"

"I've walked this earth for over nine hundred years."

"That's a long time."

"Yes it is. But it is not the end. Our men have hope, hope that they will find the other half of their soul, the only woman who can restore a Carpathian's emotions and color, who can tether his soul to the light. The pair are called lifemates. Apart they will never know true happiness or love. Together they will live a fulfilled life beyond any comprehension. Once a Carpathian male binds him and his lifemate together, then he will no longer have to fear succumbing to the darkness, to become Vampire. Lifemates are two halves of the same, light to darkness, female to male."

"Have you found your lifemate?"

"I have, although I have yet to claim her."

"And does she know that you've found her?"

His gaze bore into hers. "She does now."

Her hand slides from her throat to drop at her side.


	6. Chapter 6

For the second time tonight, Selene's legs give out from under her. But he does not move to help her this time, especially after she puts a hand up to warn him. Thankfully she lands on the edge of the bed.

Carpathians. Vampires. Lifemates.

 _This night is just getting better and better_. And it doesn't help that Damian stands there looking so calm. Then again, maybe it is because he doesn't have his emotions.

"I've regained my emotions as well as my color vision upon encountering you atop that mountain."

Not looking at him she says, "Was that before or after the Vampire attacked Vicky?"

"Before."

She sucks her teeth, a habit she usually finds rude but in this case it suits her current mood. "And why is that exactly? Why did that Vampire come after us?"

"I suppose it thought you were easy enough prey. I had been cloaking myself in the form of a hawk at the time. He must have caught your scents. Vampires go after unclaimed women, delusional in thinking that stealing someone else's lifemate will turn them back. It won't."

Finally she looks up at him. "I don't get it, though. I'm human, a witch granted, but human. How can I be a—a lifemate?"

"Human women have been known to be lifemates to Carpathian in most recent years. It's believed that is so because our race was dying out and Carpathian women were so rarely being born. To compensate, our souls became compatible with those of human women. The women have to have psychic ability. Maybe it's because you're a witch that makes you psychic."

"All witches have some psychic ability. Although my telekinetic abilities have always been stronger than my telepathic. Is that why I could hear you speak in my mind?"

"Yes. And with training you can learn to do the same. The ability is there, you just need to use it."

Selene rubs her temples. "This is all just so much to take in right now. Not only do we have to worry about Vampires attacking us, but now I am a lifemate to a stranger." She hadn't meant to say it out loud but there was no point worrying about it, he would have read it in her thoughts anyway.

Damian crosses his arms. "You are not _a lifetmate_ you are _my lifemate_. The only lifemate for me. And I do not intend for us to be strangers for much longer."

She stops rubbing her temples to look up at him. "And what exactly do you intend for us?" By the Great Goddess, he is handsome. Selene has always been tall for her age but the Carpathian must have several inches on her. She would try to size him up but she isn't too sure her wobbly legs could support her at the moment. She continues to look him up and down. His brown hair is short, shorter on the sides and fuller on the top, enough that she could run her fingers through. His shoulders are broad and despite his knit sweater she can tell he has a narrow waist. As her gaze travels up to his face once more she is horrified to see the smirk that has developed on his face. He is reading her mind, no doubt.

He takes a step closer to her, holding her gaze. "For one, I would like for you to tell me your name. I've held up my end, returning you and your friend here to safety and cooperating with your rather thorough inquisition. It's your turn. And once you've told me your name, well, we can go from there."

Selene admires his cocky attitude. Cocky indeed, but too cocky when dealing with a witch. She is half tempted to throw him across the room but just the thought makes her realize how tired she is. It doesn't help that her headache persists as she turns over the new information in her mind.

He takes another step towards her and reflexively she holds her hand up, holding him in place. "That's enough," she says. She will throw him across the room after all. Moving to stand she flicks her wrist, expecting her telekinesis to push him against the far wall, instead there is a piercing pain in her head. Crying out in pain, she lifts a hand to each side of her head.

Instinctively, he goes to her. Scooping her up into his arms and laying her down in the bed but she fights him, pushing him away.

"I need rest. I'll be fine." She's had headaches like these before, when she's tried to recall the traumas of her past. Her mind is resisting the memories because of a memory block spell she had her aunt cast when she was a child, a way to help her cope. But she hasn't tried to recall those memories in a long time, so why is the block responding to the knowledge Damian has given her? The pain is too much with him present.

"You're in pain."

"I think it's time you left."

"I can help you."

She says nothing, clutching at her head.

"I can give you blood, same as with your friend."

"Blood?"

He pushes his sleeve up to expose his forearm. "Let me do this for you, no strings attached."

She squeezes her eyes shut, the pain is blinding. She can barely think beyond the pain.

"Yes."

In an instant his forearm is in front of her mouth, the skin marred by two bloody pinpricks. "Go ahead. I offer it freely."

Selene eyes his bloody arm. She should be disgusted by it but for some reason she isn't. Without further thought, her lips press against his arm, blood seeping between her lips and into her mouth. It tastes delicious, sweet and tangy all at the same time. Her hands drop from her head and her fingers wrap around his arm, anchoring him to her. The relief is so sudden. The pain is gone almost instantaneously. She could think more clearly, causing her to wonder what precisely had brought this fit on. She hadn't been thinking about her past, not since the briefest moment when Vicky was attacked and she hadn't thought about it hard enough to trigger the block. Had her aunt put extra safeguards in her mind, a way for her to deal with stressful situations? She makes a mental note to speak to her aunt about this soon.

Damian strokes her hair with gentle fingers. "That's enough," he says as if he is the one in pain now.

She meets his gaze and lifts her head from his arm, her hands falling into her own lap. He has a hungry look in his eyes. It should scare her but it doesn't. He leans towards her. She can feel his breath on her face; he smells of the forest and of the mountain air. She should be alarmed by his closing proximity but she is transfixed by his gaze. His mouth gently presses against hers. Selene is too surprised to fight the kiss. His tongue pokes out from between his lips but he does not try to pry her lips apart. Instead, he licks the leftover blood from her lips and pulls back almost as suddenly.

Damian brings his bloodied forearm to his mouth, closing the wound and cleaning off the residual blood, holding her gaze all the while. Selene notices his incisors have lengthened.

Tearing his gaze from her, he looks at the balcony doors and then back at her. "The dawn will rise in a few hours. I rest during the day and so do Vampires. But that doesn't mean that nothing can get to you during that time. Be careful. You won't be able to reach me until the sun goes down."

"Reach you? Reach you how?"

"With your mind. Just think of me and I'll be able to hear you. By giving you my blood I have also opened a private means of communication for us."

"Will I become like you?"

He shakes his head. "It would take three blood exchanges to turn you into a Carpathian."

"Where will you go?"

His head tilts to the side. "Do you worry about me?" She says nothing. "I have a place where I will be safe. I should go." He turns to do just that.

"Wait."

He stops.

"My wards. I have to undo them." He waits.

The action doesn't require her to get up from the bed but she does so, if only so that she is side by side with him. A moment later she says, "It's done."

Without looking at her, Damian nods his thanks. With a wave of his hand, the door to the balcony opens. He takes a step toward the exit.

"My name is Selene. Selene Dauphin."

He stops to look over his shoulder at her. "I shall see you again soon, Selene." And with that he exits the room at the inn.

Selene watches as he changes shape in the blink of an eye, becoming a hawk. She stands there at the open balcony door until he is no longer in sight. With a wave of her hand the door closes once more and she places her wards back up. Only when she's drawn the curtains and turned back to the bed does she let her hand fly to her lips, recalling the feeling of his lips against hers and the taste of his blood.


	7. Chapter 7

Selene. Her name is Selene and what a beautiful name it is.

Taking his blood to take away her pain was an act of desperation on her part. But telling him her name, that is a sign of a building trust between them. Beneath the form of the hawk, he smiles.

He's practically in disbelief. Just when he had prepared himself to seek the dawn, he finds his lifemate; a beautiful young woman with a contending and inquisitive personality. He relished in every moment inside the inn. Damian spent many years wondering if he'd ever find his lifemate, and what she might be like. But he had never imagined her, or how she would bring that spark into back into his life. And Selene certainly did that. He looks forward to how she might continue to challenge him.

However, Damian knows he's running on empty. He has been since he gave the dark-skinned witch, Vicky, blood to heal the wound in her neck. And he gave more than he should have to his lifemate. What else could he do? She was in pain and his blood took it away. And now he suffers the consequence. Deep and aggressive hunger. He must find sustenance before he settles to rest in the earth, otherwise he will wake next rising with an insatiable hunger and not even he is sure that he can control it. He refuses to even entertain the idea.

Damian is glad she put her wards back up upon his exit. He doesn't trust himself to stay away from her without them. And he would go back if he could. He could simply watch her—the way she moves, it's not only fascinatingly sexy but she has a way about her he just can't put to words, something close to magical. But he can't even consider going back to the inn with him in his current state. His hunger gnaws at him, tempts him. He must find prey soon, or else.

He is far from the inn now, enough to be out of her sight. He will now hunt his prey.

Sunrise isn't far off, leaving Damian little time to be choosy with his prey. He will have to hunt on his way to his place of rest; a cave with rich and nutritious soil in the Carpathian Mountains.

He flies over a farm, the farmer just getting up to start his daily routine. This opportunity is as good as any. Damian touches down on the farmland, once again in his human form, awaiting the farmer to exit his home and enter the barn. He takes a step forward and hears a jingle in his pocket. Keys. Selene's keys. He'd swiped them from her belongings before leaving. And he'd told her that he would have her car back at the inn.

The farmer crosses the space between his home and the barn. He doesn't have time to do both and he refuses to go back on his word. Cursing, he takes to the sky once again.

By the time he turns off the ignition, the sun is beginning to peek out in the horizon. His eyes burn and his body is beginning to feel leaden. There is not enough time to make it to the cave.

Damian looks up at the inn. He has two choices. He can find a place here and bury himself in the earth, leaving himself exposed to numerous dangers, or he can go back to her room and hope that she grants him entry and that he has enough restraint to not feed from her. He doesn't like his choices. As much as he doesn't want to put himself in front of temptation, he cannot risk being so unguarded and in the open while he rests the healing sleep of his people.

In the end, there really isn't a choice. In an instant he is on the balcony, knocking on the glass door and fighting exhaustion. The few seconds that he waits seem life centuries as he reminds himself to be in control. Finally, the curtain is pulled back on the other side of the door. She is there, his lifemate. Selene.

She's still wearing her tank top and pajama pants. He wishes in that moment for her to be covered up completely in the least form fitting clothes possible.

She looks at him, a silent question on her face. He realizes that she's trying to communicate in his mind. _What are you doing, here? I thought you had to go to ground before sunrise_.

 _I ran out of time. Selene, I understand if you won't let me in but if I'm still out here when the sun rises, I will die. Decide now, so that I can take shelter elsewhere_.

He watches as she hesitates for a moment, weighing the pros and cons of the situation. Then she mutters words, presumably undoing her wards. With a flick of her wrist, the balcony door slides open.

"Before I come in, know that I am not at my best. Don't let your guard down."

She nods, stepping back from the doorway.

Damian steps inside, the door closing behind him. He's immediately hit by a wave of scents. There is a charged energy in the room. Looking around the room he sees the candles are still lit and she's been burning incense, the strongest of which were amber and lavender.

She gave him a lot of space. A smart move. He didn't trust himself close to her.

He walks to the dresser and retrieved her car keys from his jeans pocket. "Your car is out front, along with the belongings you left on the mountain."

"Thank you." She keeps her distance. "Is there anything I do for you?"

Damian thinks of several things but did not breathe a word of any of it. Instead he says, "In a few moments I will be overcome with fatigue, involuntarily entering the sleep of my people. I don't have long, so listen carefully. When I rest all brain activity and bodily functions will shut down. I will not breathe, nor will my heart beat. You will think me dead, but I assure you I am alive. You cannot let any sunlight into the room or it will kill me. Do not attempt to wake me, not even when the sun sets. I am hungry. I did not have the opportunity to replenish the blood I gave you and Vicky. I will be ravenous when I awaken. It's best you stay out of my way, or else. I don't know what I will do."

He stumbles, catching his hand on the dresser to stay upright. Selene takes a step towards him.

"Don't," he warns.

"Take the bed," she says, "before you collapse."

She's handling this better than he'd hoped. Nodding, he does as she suggested, walking over to the bed.

"I apologize for having to put you out."

"I couldn't sleep anyway."

He's too tired to will away his shoes. With his remaining strength, he slides onto the bed. He doesn't look at her directly.

"Remember what I've told you, Selene."

She nods.

He would have preferred to be in the earth, the healing soil surrounding his body. But this, this is the next best place for him. He may not have claimed her yet but simply being in her presence is anchoring his soul. His eyes drift closed and he allows himself the healing sleep of his people.


	8. Chapter 8

She watches as his chest no longer rises. He told her not to let her guard down. Thus she stands in the same spot for at least an hour, waiting for something to happen that never does.

He told her that all of his brain activity would cease, along with his other bodily functions. The room is so quiet, she hears her own heartbeat thudding in her chest, but nothing else. She tries to reach out to his mind. Nothing. A blank void.

 _Why did I let him in?_ she wonders.

Because she didn't have the heart to turn him away. Not after how the last few hours went, not after whatever it is that has been transpiring between them since they met. She let him in, despite every alarm going off in her head. Her headache had returned at the sight of him, because the sight of him brought up the information he'd told her. She _will_ speak to her aunt about what is going on, why there is a block on her mind and why it is activated whenever she thinks about Carpathians. And at the thought, the headaches return. Selene shakes her head, attempting to clear the thoughts from her mind.

He had warned her to stay away. But the sun had risen and for all intensive purposes, he was dead. He said he wouldn't wake until the sun went down. She was safe until then, right?

Selene feels like an idiot standing there.

She looks to the bed at Damian's still supine form on the bed. She regards his shoes still on his feet. Her mother never liked shoes to be worn in the house.

Ignoring his warning as well as her own, she moves towards him, stopping at the foot of the bed.

Selene reaches a hesitant hand towards him. She'd never be hesitant in her life, not before last night. She endeavores to take life head on, consequences be damned.

At ten-years-old she became an orphan, forced to move to Romania to live with her mother's only living relative. Ever since then, Selene lives and breathes magick. Her aunt, Celia Dauphin, is the High Priestess of their coven and she is grooming Selene to one day take her place. She is supposed to set the prime example for the entire coven. It's stifling, having her life mapped out for her by someone else. And now enters Damian, telling her that she is his lifemate, the other half to his soul. As if she needs someone else to plan out her future for her. She should want to run away from him, like she does with her aunt, coming here with Vicky to cast spells outside of the safety of the coven, but for some reason he intrigues her. Perhaps it's the fact that thinking about what he is triggers the block on her mind—the same block her aunt put there. For whatever reason, Aunt Celia does not want her to think about Carpathians and that makes Selene want to learn even more.

Selene doesn't want to be the careful and meticulous witch her aunt expects her to be. She wants to be reckless and daring. She only has this life, why not make it more interesting.

She reaches her hand the rest of the way, grabbing onto Damian's shoe. Nothing happens; he doesn't move an inch. Wrapping her other hand around the heel of his shoe, she tugs it off and drops it on the floor at the foot of the bed before tugging off the other shoe.

Well, she certainly tempted fate there and wasn't scalded. How much could she get away with?

Selene moves farther alongside the bed until she is adjacent to Damian's waist. Looking down at him she regards his features. She's been fooled by boys with good looks before. Boys. But Damian isn't a boy. He's lived over nine centuries. That's enough time for a boy to become a man, surely. She can't help but wonder if he's more than just a pretty face. He'd proven to stay true to his word so far. _Does that make him honorable?_ And he'd certainly been honest. _Does that make him truthful?_

Without being able to discern anything else about his character do to his current comatose state, Selene decides that while she continues to tempt fate, the only thing she can discern is whether his body lives up to the expectations of her imagination.

Since he practically collapsed onto the bed moments after she let him back inside the room, not only did he forget to remove his boots, he was still fully clothed in a sweater and jeans. Selene felt hot just looking at him. Sure, the mountain air has a certain chill at this time of year but the inn is heated and even in her thin tank top and pajama pants, his attire is stifling.

 _I suppose it couldn't hurt to relieve you of your current situation, even though you're not aware of it_ , she musses.

Leaning onto the bed next to his hip she reaches for the bottom hem of his sweater, sliding the material beneath him up the length of his body. She sucks in air at the sight of his stomach. She'd taken art classes in college. Damian would rival Adonis himself with the definition of his abdomen. Releasing her breath, she continues to relieve him of his sweater.

Getting his arms through the sleeves was the trickest part; his arms are like tree trunks, thick with corded muscle. At the time, Selene didn't have to mind to marvel at the ease he carried Vicky from the mountain. Now, she can't help but wonder what it would feel like to be carried in such strong arms. Pulling his other arm from the sleeve, the rest is easy and in one smooth motion, the sweater is over his head.

Dropping the sweater on the floor next to the bed, her gaze sweeps over the length of him. Her stomach tightens and heat pools low at her admiration of his anatomy.

Her gaze lands on the waistband of his jeans. As much as she would like to relieve him of his pants as well, there is a line there and she refuses to cross it any further. Her gaze sweeps back up to his face, relaxed in his dead-like sleep state. If she didn't know any better she would have thought him to be no more than twenty-eight-years-old.

Selene turned twenty-two last week. Her aunt always kept her cooped up on her birthday, claiming that it was safer for her to celebrate within the confines of the coven than to go gallivanting along the streets of Romania. It's part of the reason she wanted to get away for a few days with Vicky.

Twenty-two years feels like such a small number compared to his nine hundred. No doubt at her age, she is a child in Damian's eyes.

A knock at the door startles her. In an instant she's standing, glancing to the door then Damian and then back.

"Who's there?"

"Sel, it's me."

Selene rushes to the door at the sound of Vicky's voice. Dismantling her wards, she opens the door just enough to step back out and into the hallway. Vicky looks withdrawn. That doesn't surprise Selene, given what Vicky went through only hours ago.

When she closes the door behind her, Vicky's eyes narrow. "Mind if we talk in your room?" asks Selene.

Vicky says nothing in response, turning instead to go back to her room. Selene follows her. Once inside with the door closed behind them, Vicky whirls on her.

"What the hell happened last night?"

"Vic, I need you to listen to what I am going to tell you and to not freak out."

"I had my neck chewed out by some psycho, some bird came out of nowhere, turned into a man and incinerated him and then fed me blood before flying us back here. Tell me that didn't actually happen."

"We're witches, Vicky. It stands to reason that there are other things out there beside us, supernatural things."

She holds out a warning hand to Selene. Her pitch raises. "How can you be so calm about this? I need you to not be you, right now. Tell me I'm crazy and that the spell backfired and I imagined all of that."

Selene shakes her head. "You didn't imagine it. It all happened."

"If what you say is true then everything is different now."

The words aren't coming out for Selene. She tries to come up with a way to explain things to Vicky but thinking about the Vampire and Damian being Carpathian causes her head to throb. Wincing at the pain, she says, "Look, I can't explain every detail right now. But there are some things you need to know. The thing that attacked you was a Vampire." Seeing Vicky's eyes widen, Selene continues. "Yes, they're real. Somehow it sensed that we were up there and it attacked you for your blood. It would have killed you if Damian didn't intervene."

"Who's Damian."

"Damian is the one who saved you. He was the hawk on the mountain, watching us cast the spell when we were attacked." Anticipating Vicky's next question, she adds, "and no, he's not a familiar."

"What is he?"

"That's a little more complicated."

"He had me drink his blood. Was that real too?"

Selene nods. "His blood has a healing quality. Look, what's most important is that we're okay, you're okay. Vampires can't get us during the day."

"What aren't you telling me?"

Selene sighs. She wishes she had more time with Damian to sort it all out between them. The block on her mind isn't helping. "The reason I wanted to talk in here is because Damian is in my room resting."

"You let him stay in your room? Are you crazy? You said he's not a familiar. But he must be some sort of shapeshifter. How can you know what his intentions are?"

Selene shakes her head. "I told you I can't explain it all now. It seems my loving aunt put a block on my mind. For whatever reason, she doesn't want me to know about what Damian is. I get a massive headache whenever I think about it."

"Do you have a headache now?"

"Yes. It may hurt to think about it but the block on my mind couldn't stop him from telling me what he is. He told me and I trust him. I don't know if it's the right decision; I'm still figuring it all out but he saved you, Vicky. He doesn't mean us any harm."

Vicky moves to sit down on the bed. Putting her head in her hands, she says, "I'm sorry."

Selene moves closer to her. "You have nothing to be sorry for."

"Yes, I do. I dragged you out here. If I'd been stronger, I wouldn't have needed that spell for strength, not that we actually got to complete it, anyway. Coming out here almost got us killed. At the new moon, I'll fail Celia's tests and I'll have to wait even longer to be a third level witch."

Selene sits down next to her friend, wrapping her arm around her. "None of this is on you. I agreed to come out here. If we hadn't, who knows if I would've learned about the block on my mind."

Vicky lifts her head up to regard Selene. "Why would your aunt do that?"

"I have no idea but I have every intention of questioning her."

"She's probably livid. We said we'd be gone three days. It's now the forth. She's been blowing up my phone but I didn't have the guts to answer."

"That reminds me, my phone is in my car."

"I'll go with you to get it."

Selene stands. "Thanks."

Vicky stands as well. "What are you going to do about the man in your room?"

"I wish I knew. I'm taking this as it comes."


	9. Chapter 9

Selene slams the door to Vicky's room shut./p

Shoving her car keys and her phone into her pajama pants pocket, she says "That was a waste."

"You knew your aunt would be upset we've been gone, I don't know why you expected her to be reasonable."

Selene shrugs. "I agreed to let her put a spell on me to ease the memories of my mother's death, not to put some block on my mind against Carpathians."

"I thought she didn't admit it."

"She didn't have to. I know she did. I could tell from her voice. I just don't know why. And she's not going to tell me anything until we get back."

"She said that?" Selene nods. "So we're going back, then."

"Not yet. I still have the simple manner of an unconscious Carpathian in my bed."

"You keep using that word. Carpathian."

"That's what he is. I'll find a way to give you the full details later, once I get my aunt to take the block off my mind."

"Is your head hurting you?"

"Not as bad as earlier. I'm trying to think less about it. Regardless, Damian is next door and nothing can be done until sundown."

"Speaking of Damian..." Vicky trails off.

"What?"

Vicky tilts her head in the direction of Selene's room. "Can I see him?"

"You want to see him? What for?"

"You said he's unconscious, right?" The corners of her mouth tug into a smirk. "Oh, don't look at me like that. I'm curious."

Selene rolls her eyes. "I guess it wouldn't hurt."

Selene leads the way back into her own room, sealing them both in with her wards.

Vicky approaches the bed slowly.

"Don't worry. You can't wake him." Vicky arches her brow as she glances over at her friend. "He won't wake until sundown."

"He's not so scary when he looks likes this."

Selene scoffs. Moving around Vicky, she sits on the edge of the bed next to Damian's body. Vicky stands just behind her, peering over her shoulder.

"Was he always shirtless?" Vicky asks with a tilt of her head.

"That was my doing. I got curious."

Vicky shakes her head. "Of course you did. That's what you do. You get curious and then you get bored."

"I do not!" Selene turns back to her friend.

"Oh, really. Remind me again what happened with Tom?"

She rolls her eyes. "My aunt set us up."

"Yeah, but you were interested in the beginning and then you got bored."

"We went on three dates. It took three dates to realize he's just like his father. Why would I want to get involved with that?"

"His father is the High Priest of the coven."

"And that's exactly why I'm glad I 'got bored' so quickly." She turns back to look at Damian. "I don't see myself getting bored anytime soon."

"How could you? He looks like a god."

"I don't know why I let you in here."

"It's because I'm relentless."

"As much fun as this has been, you should go. The sun will be setting soon and I don't know what to expect."

"Sel, I'm not leaving you alone when this guy wakes up."

She peels her gaze from Damian. "I made my choice when I let him back in here. I'm not putting you in danger. I've made my bed and now I have to sleep in it."

"And that's exactly why I'm not going. What if he tries something?"

"Our magic works on their kind. I can protect myself."

"The silence stretches out between them.

"Selene peers at the clock on the bedside table.

"You really should go."  
Vicky releases a long breath. "I'll be on the other side of that wall."

"You know I'll call if I need you."

"You better." She turns on her heels and flees the room.

Selene places double the wards on her room just in case. 


	10. Chapter 10

Damian wakes the instant the sun sets. There's something to be said for a Carpathian's biological clock; they always know when the sun is rising and setting. But this is not how he would have preferred to awaken. He is ravenous. Hunger gripping at him. His throat is dry and his insides are cramping. And when he takes his waking breath, he can smell her, Selene Dauphin, only a few feet away from him.

His eyes pop open and he sits up from the bed. She is there across the room from him with her arms crossed in front of her chest. He notices immediately that she has changed, donning ripped black jeans and a top that look very much like a woman's brazier with a black long-sleeved fishnet over it. She is flushed, he can see it from where he sits on the bed. His gaze is drawn to her neck, her pulse visible beneath her pink skin.

He hadn't even thought about it, he simply springs up from the bed in attempt to close the distance between them. And he almost makes it until he hits an invisible wall.

"What is this?" he asks, irritated.

"It's magick, of course."

There is no way he could forget his lifemate to be a witch. He simply hadn't expected her to take the proper precautions against him. He is glad she did.

Shaking his head, he has a moment of clarity.

"Selene," he says her name for the first time this rising, "I need to leave. I must feed and I can't trust myself with you." He tries to move toward the balcony door, fighting his every instinct to attack her.

"Damian," she says his name in warning.

He stops, turning back to her, he once again encounters the barrier of her magick.

It had crossed her mind, moments before he awakened. What if he comes across Vicky or another patron of the inn? What if he can't control himself then? She wouldn't be there to stop him. He had warned her how thin the line is between Carpathian and Vampire. Despite the pain in her head brought on by thinking about it, she can't help herself.

"How much do you need?" she asks. He knows what she means.

"More than you could give."

"But would it be enough? Enough to stop—"

"No. I can't trust myself to stop feeding from you. I'm passed my limit."

"Then trust me to stop you."

He would be able to admire her resolve more if the hunger didn't consume his every breath. The pain is becoming more than he can bear. He is close. The line he has fought so hard to not cross has blurred.

Suddenly, the barrier falls away.

"Selene, no."

But he can't help himself and he charges toward her.

"I'll stop you," she whispers and he takes her into his arms. She catches the sight of his lengthened incisors just before he lowers his head.

She expects the pain of his bite and is surprised that it doesn't come, not immediately. His teeth graze her throat, skimming along her sensitized skin. With rough fingers he smooths away the collar of her fishnet top, hooking the strap of her bralette aside, exposing her collar bone. His teeth sink just below.

Selene sees white beneath her eyelids, the pain like nothing other. But there is something else there, another sensation. The closest thing she can compare it to is the euphoria one experiences after preforming in the great rite, a ritual ceremony that involves the combining of magick of the whole coven. It's almost enough to block the migraine that has erupted in her head.

She tastes like the forest and fire. It's intoxicating. He can't get enough and draws more of her lifeblood into him. It rejuvenates him. It should satiate him but it doesn't. He can't get enough. He must have more. So he takes.

One of his hands has shifted, resting on her chest above her heart. The more blood he drinks, the slower her heart beats. The last remaining rational part of his mind knows that he is killing her. He is killing his lifemate. She tastes too good to stop.

 _Selene_ , he says into her mind. _Do as you said. I am trusting you to stop me_.

She doesn't even raise a restraining hand towards him.

He trusted her to stop him.

 _Selene, you must do it now. I am killing you. Selene!_

It's the smallest movement and then an invisible force tosses him across the room, against the wall. He lands on his hands and knees.

Damian looks up to see her collapse. Instantly, his mind has cleared. Tearing open his wrist, he rushes to his lifemate. She's so pale, he almost closes his eye to the sight. He doesn't, though, knowing that he must see this, he must see what he's done.

She doesn't fight him when he presses his wrist to her lips. How could she? There is no fight left in her.

Ever so slowly, her coloring returns. He holds her, cradled in his arms on the floor. She feels weightless, but guilt weighs down on his soul. Nine-hundred years he has waited for his lifemate and not even twenty-four hours he nearly killed her.

When he has given her enough, he peels his wrist away from her mouth, his thumb smooths the crimson bead on her bottom lip, staining her lip red. Brown eyes open to meet his gaze and he can't help it, he kisses her.

Damian is surprised that she has enough strength to kiss him back but she does. If he thought her blood tasted good, that was before he tasted her lips. He eases her lips apart with his tongue. She tastes divine.

Reluctantly, he withdraws almost as quickly. Leaning his forehead on hers he utters her name aloud for the second time this rising, followed by an apology.

Selene brings her hand up to rest on his chest and for the first time, Damian notices his half-nakedness.

"I told you I would stop you," she breathes.

Damian smiles. "And you did."

Gently, he stands up, lifting her with him. Despite the blood exchange, the whole ordeal seems to have taken a lot out of her. He places her on the bed.

With merely a thought, he is fully clothed again.

"Well, that's convenient."

"I should go. I'll return when my hunger is completely satiated." He looks at the balcony door, sensing her wards.

"Just give me a moment." He looks back at her. She seems so fragile, sitting there, but he knows better. "It should be okay, now."

He should leave, he knows this. Instead he kneels in front of her, taking both of her hands in his own. "I'll be back." He plants a kiss on her forehead. Turning into mist, he disappears from her sight.


	11. Chapter 11

What just happened? Selene asks herself.

She practically offered herself to him to drink her blood. There was no practically, that's exactly what she did. And he drank. A lot.

She felt her life draining from her with each second passing and for some reason she didn't want to fight it. Nothing in her life had felt as real as it had in those moments. Then he reminded her to stop him.

The next thing she knew, he was on the floor across the room. She watched silently and he came back. He wasn't going to attack her again, somehow she knew. And then she was in his arms and he was apologizing.

She remains on the bed where he left her. She has half a mind to let Vicky know that she is alright. But a part of her is waiting for Damian's return and doesn't want to risk Vicky seeing her as she is now, not when they have so much air to clear between them.

Damian takes to the sky in the form of mist, scanning his surrounds for someone to feed upon. He won't feed on anyone at the inn. They are protected by the prince of the Carpathians. And besides, he doesn't want to cause more trouble for Selene than he already has.

Damian nearly killed her. He's put her in danger since the moment he saw her on the mountain and she slipped through his fingers. He couldn't resist meeting her and he couldn't resist being close to her even under such dire circumstances. This is a disaster waiting to happen. If he doesn't claim her fast, there is no telling how long he will be able to continue without falling into temptation and becoming Vampire.

He finds prey quickly, a drunken patron from a tavern down the road, luring him in and sinking his teeth into the man's neck.

Despite the alcohol in his prey's system, the man's blood tastes good. He drinks deeply. In the back of his mind he knows that Selene is waiting for him back at the inn.

Suddenly, his lifemate's voice penetrates his thoughts.

 _How far did you go?_

 _Not far_ , he responds. _I'll be back in ten minutes._

His withdraws from the man's neck. And just like that his lifemate grounds him; unintentionally reminding him of what he would lose if he crosses the line.

Damian alters the man's memories and leaves him in the alley behind the tavern. Taking to the sky, he returns to the inn. He returns to Selene.

He opens the balcony door with ease, stepping inside the room.

 _Why didn't you put the wards back up?_ He looks around and she is nowhere to be seen.

"I'm in the bathroom," she calls out. "And I knew you were on your way back."

He prefers their more intimate form of communicating.

As if reading his mind she says, _I'm coming out now._

She steps out of the bathroom, having removed the fishnet layer, leaving only the burgundy brazier that was underneath. He has seen her in less but for some reason lowers his gaze.

"You left a mark on me," she says, indicating a section of purpled skin below her right collar bone.

The corners of his mouth pull into a smile. "How else will they know you're mine."

"Who's _they_?"

"Other Carpathians. Vampires. Patrons at this inn."

"Seeing as you're the first Carpathian I've met, I don't think it will be so soon that I'll encounter another. I don't intend to encounter anymore Vampires for that matter. As for 'patrons of this inn', I don't think it's any of their business who I spend my time with."

"And what of Vicky? Do you care about what she thinks."

"Vicky doesn't know you well enough to judge you. She thought she imagined the whole Vampire attack until I told her it was true. She looks out for me but knows I ultimately make my own choices."

Selene moves closer to him. "We have some things to discuss."

"I thought that is what we were doing."

"I mean about us."

Damian likes the sound of that. "What about _us_?"

Selene motions for him to sit down. He's taller than her but enough that she has to tilt her head back to look up to him.

"You first," he says.

"I insist." She's stubborn and he likes it. Damian never fancied himself a lifemate that would obey him in all things. He likes a challenge and she certainly challenges him.

Deciding to make her squirm a bit, he let's the moment draw out until he finally sits down on the bed. With an unconscious sway of her hips, she moves to sit next to him. She is so alluring that all he can think about is undressing her with his eyes. He starts with that small top she wears that resembles an undergarment.

"Well?" She looks at him.

His mind is instantly sobers. He gestures to her with an open hand. "I believe the floor is yours."

Her brows draw together. "What happens now? Between us, I mean. You have lived over nine centuries and you still look like you haven't reached thirty. I'm mortal and I will age...much quicker than you."

"There is a way to make you like me."

Selene stills. "What do you mean?"

He watches her. "Three blood conversions will convert you into a Carpathian like me."

"Conversions?"

"Exchanging approximately equal amounts of blood. Just like tonight, when I drank your blood and then gave you my own. That would be needed two more times to convert you."

"Why didn't you tell me this before."

"I'm telling you now."

She moves to stand, changing the dynamic between them. "Will this one conversion hurt me in any way?"

"If it's isolated, no. But with another blood exchange, you might start to see some physiological changes. For example, you might be more fatigued during the time the sun is at its highest point of the day."

"Will I need to drink blood?"

"No. Not until you are converted."

She backs away from him like a cornered animal, clutching her head.

"Is your head hurting you? We can stop if this is causing you pain."

He tries to push into her mind but she is keeping him out. Damian knows little about women, let alone a witch of these modern times. He studies her, trying to determine where the conversation went so wrong.

She won't even look at him.

Suddenly he stands. "Selene."

It's the way he says her name that makes her meet his gaze.

"You don't think that I would make this choice for you, do you?"

The palms of her hands push on either side of her head.

"Do you want to stop?"

She shakes her head. "I don't know what to think."

"To convert you would mean that we both agreed on it."

"And what if I don't agree?"

"Then I wouldn't even consider it. Only if your life were in danger would I ever...forget that. Selene, if you choose not to become Carpathian, then I would choose a mortal life, to end my life when yours ends."

"I thought you are in danger of becoming Vampire?"

"That is still true. If I claim you then our souls would be tied together, preventing me from becoming Vampire."

"You've said that before. What do you mean by claim?"

"It is a ritual similar to how you would cast a spell. I would recite words to tie us together, sealing our lifemate bond. Once done it cannot be undone. However, with you Carpathian or human, once you die, that possible threat of me becoming Vampire returns. I won't have the strength to take myself from this world. I will have to have someone else do it. Just like I did for Bash."

"Who?" Her eyes are bloodshot but he doesn't comment.

Damian shakes his head. "The night I first saw you on the mountain...I had just taken the life of my long time companion and friend. He did not have the strength to greet the dawn and became Vampire. It took me some time but I finally did it."

"You killed him." It is not a question.

He nods.

Suddenly, Selene's knees buckle. He steps nearer to her but out of caution stops himself from moving too close.

"Selene."

"The pain. We need to stop talking about this, at least until I get my aunt to remove this block."

"Okay."

She takes a few deep breaths. "Tell me what will happen when I leave."

"Leave?"

"I leave tomorrow. I'm going back home. My aunt will remove the block and then I'll have to tell her about the encounter with the Vampire and with you. The coven will need to know about a possible threat. I can't have you following me until I know how they will take it."

"Are you telling me to let you go?"

She nods. "Just for now."

This enrages him. He closes the distance between them, taking an arm in each hand, he pulls her up to her feet. Keeping his hold on her he says, "You know what finding you means to me."

The sight of her cowering in front of him makes him let her go. He steps back.

"I won't hurt you, Selene."

She's so tense that her shoulders are practically touching her ears. "I'd like to think that. But after what just happened earlier and after everything you've told me, I realize that I don't even know you."

He moves back to the bed, putting some space between them and letting a silence stretch out so that he can decide how to proceed. Once seated he says, "Don't you see that this is the whole point of me being here? I want to get to know you, Selene. And I want you to get to know me."

Her posture relaxes. "Then tell me. Tell me about you," she waves her hands in the air, "without all the technical stuff that makes my head hurt."

Damian shrugs, rubbing his hand across his face. When it drops into his lap he says, "I don't know what to say yet. I've barely been anything but a hunter for the last few centuries. But I want this to work. If you are going home then I will give you the space. Just don't forget about me, that's all I ask."

She can feel the pull to go to him. Selene does her best to ignore it but it's nearly impossible. He looks as if his entire world has been crushed. In an instant she's in front of the bed, placing both hands on his shoulders, she crawls onto his lap, straddling him.

"I'm not an idiot. I feel something between us. I just can't let myself make decisions when my mind is all messed up. I need the truth, and as much as you would give it to me, I know you don't have all the answers and right now, even if you did, I can't hear them. The pain is too much. Let me sort out this thing with my aunt and the coven. I won't forget you, that I promise."

He hesitantly places his hands on her hips. Selene presses her forehead to his and he releases a long breath. He'd thought he was losing her and then she goes and makes him a promise.

As if to assuage him further, she speaks into his mind. _What will you do while I'm gone?_ "

He smiles, their foreheads still pressed together. _I will seek out the Carpathian Prince, announcing my presence here. And then I will seek out my remaining family; two cousins and their lifemates. I would like to like to have my own place in the mountains._

 _That sounds wonderful._ She pulls away to look into his eyes. "Will I be able to speak to you like that while we're apart?"

Damian shakes his head. "It won't work over such distance. I could get a mobile phone."

She laughs. "Of course."


End file.
